I always tell my students to go back after a hundred pages and rewrite from the beginning. It's really harder if you've already finished four hundred pages and realize the first hundred aren't working.

In China, your freedom is always limited, but this limitation applies to almost everyone. If someone does injustice to you, though, you have to find a way to avenge yourself - even by illegal measures. In a sense, injustice is more personal. This idea has always been in Chinese history. I think we read about freedom of speech, or lack of freedom of speech, in China so often. But I don't think people here in America think about how justice, or the idea of justice, is so important in a Chinese setting. It's probably more important than freedom of speech in the Chinese mindset at this moment.

Only the smaller fish pay for the goverment's face-lift. The big ones - they just become bigger and fatter.

Regarding heroism, I grew up in a culture where you learn about heroes and heroines all the time. In a way, when you call someone a hero or heroine, it's the same as calling them a villain.

One easy mistake to make with the first novel is to expand the short story. Some things are better as a story; you cannot dilute things into a novel. I think the first hundred pages of a novel are very important. That's where you set things up: the world, the characters. Once you've set that up, it'll be much easier.

Chinese people don't care about freedom, but they do care about justice.

There is a certain amount of politeness here in America, which is probably more than just politeness.